knowing how impossible it was to obtain such exact information as he seemed determined to have, should have divined the enemy's plan, and acted sooner. The accurate information necessary for such foresight was not obtainable; in fact, it seldom is, and some allowance may be made if the general lingered before rushing into the "tube of a funnel," as Marmont expressed it. On the morning of the thirteenth, while the final arrangements for marching to Leipsic were making, came the news of Bavaria's defection. It spread throughout the army like wildfire, but its effect was less than might be imagined, and it served for the priming of a bulletin, issued on the fifteenth, announcing the approaching battle.

On the fifteenth, Murat, who had been steadily withdrawing before the allied army of the South, was overtaken at Wachau by Schwarzenberg's van. He fought all day with magnificent courage, and successfully, hurling the hostile cavalry skirmishers back on the main column. Within sound of his guns, Napoleon was reconnoitering his chosen battle-field in and about Leipsic; and when, after nightfall, the brothers-in-law met, the necessary arrangements were virtually complete. Those who were present at the council thought the Emperor inexplicably calm and composed—they said indifferent or stolid. But he had reasons to be confident rather than desperate, for by a touch of his old energy he had concentrated more swiftly than his foe, having a hundred and seventy thousand men in array. Reynier, with fourteen thousand more, was near; if Saint-Cyr and Lobau, with their thirty thousand, had been present instead of sitting idly in Dresden, the French would actually have outnumbered any army the coalition could have assembled for battle. The allies could hope at best to produce two hundred thousand men; Bernadotte was still near Merseburg; Blücher, though coming in from Halle, was not within striking distance. In spite of his vacillation and final failure to evacuate Dresden, Napoleon had an excellent fighting chance.

The city of Leipsic, engirdled by numerous villages, lies in a low plain watered by the Parthe, Pleisse, and Elster, the last of which to the westward has several arms, with swampy banks. Across these runs the highway to Frankfort, elevated on a dike, and spanning the deep, central stream of the Elster by a single bridge. Eastward by Connewitz the land is higher, there being considerable swells, and even hills, to the south and southeast. This rolling country was that chosen by Napoleon for the main battle against Schwarzenberg; Marmont was stationed north of the city, near Möckern, to observe Blücher; Bernadotte, the cautious, was still at Oppin with his Swedes. On the evening of the fifteenth, his dispositions being complete, Napoleon made the tour of all his posts. At dusk three white rockets were seen to rise in the southern sky; they were promptly answered by four red ones in the north. These were probably signals between Schwarzenberg and Blücher. Napoleon's watch-fire was kindled behind the old guard, between Reudnitz and Crottendorf.

The battle began early next morning. Napoleon waited until nine, and then advanced at the head of his guards to Liebertwolkwitz, near Wachau, on the right bank of the Pleisse, where the decisive struggle was sure to occur, since the mass of the enemy, under Barclay, with Wittgenstein as second in command, had attacked in four columns at that point. Between the Pleisse and the Elster, near Connewitz, stood Poniatowski, opposed to Schwarzenberg and Meerveldt; westward of the Elster, near Lindenau, stood Bertrand, covering the single line of retreat, the Frankfort highway, and his antagonist was Gyulay. Thus there were four divisions in the mighty conflict, which began by an onset of the allies along the entire front. The main engagement was stubborn and bloody, the allies attacking with little skill, but great bravery. Until near midday Napoleon more than held his own. Victor at Wachau, and Lauriston at Liebertwolkwitz, had each successfully resisted six desperate assaults; between them were massed the artillery, a hundred and fifty guns, under Drouot, and behind, all the cavalry except that of Sebastiani. The great artillery captain was about to give the last splendid exhibition of what his arm can do under favorable circumstances—that is, when strongly posted in the right position and powerfully supported by cavalry. He intended, with an awful shock and swift pursuit, to break through the enemy's center at Güldengossa and surround his right. So great was his genius for combinations that while the allies were that moment using three hundred and twenty-five thousand effective men all told to his two hundred and fourteen thousand, yet in the decisive spot he had actually concentrated a hundred and fifteen thousand to their hundred and fourteen thousand. This was because Schwarzenberg, having attempted to outflank the French, was floundering to no avail in the swampy meadows between the Pleisse and the Elster, and was no longer a factor in the contest.

When, at midday, all was in readiness and the order was given, the artillery fire was so rapid that the successive shots were heard, not separately, but in a long, sullen note. By two, Victor and Oudinot on the right, with Mortier and Macdonald on the left, were well forward of Güldengossa, but the place itself still held out. At three the cavalry, under Murat, Latour-Maubourg, and Kellermann, were sped direct upon it. With awful effort they broke through, and the bells of Leipsic began to ring in triumph—prematurely. The Czar had peremptorily summoned from Schwarzenberg's command the Austro-Russian reserve, and at four these, with the Cossack guard, charged the French cavalry, hurling them back to Markkleeberg. Nightfall found Victor again at Wachau, and Macdonald holding Liebertwolkwitz. Simultaneously with the great charge of the allies Meerveldt had dashed out from Connewitz toward Dölitz, but his force was nearly annihilated, and he himself was captured. At Möckern, Marmont, after gallant work with inferior numbers, had been beaten on his left, and then compelled for safety to draw in his right. While he still held Gohlis and Eutritzsch, the mass of his army had been thrown back into Leipsic. Throughout the day Bertrand made a gallant and successful resistance to superior numbers, and drove that portion of the allied forces opposed to him away from Lindenau as far as Plagwitz. At nightfall three blank shots announced the cessation of hostilities all around.

In the face of superior numbers, the French had not lost a single important position, and whatever military science had been displayed was all theirs; Blücher made the solitary advance move of the allies, the seizure of Möckern by York's corps; Schwarzenberg had been literally mired in his attempt to outflank his enemy, and but for Alexander's peremptory recall of the reserves destined for the same task, the day would have been one of irretrievable disaster to the coalition. Yet Napoleon knew that he was lost unless he could retreat. Clearly he had expected a triumph, for in the city nothing was ready, and over the Elster was but one crossing, the solitary bridge on the Frankfort road. The seventeenth was the first day of the week; both sides were exhausted, and the Emperor of the French seems to have felt that at all hazards he must gain time. During the previous night long consultations had been held, and the French divisions to the south had been slightly compacted. In the morning Meerveldt, the captured Austrian general, the same man who after Austerlitz had solicited and obtained on the part of Francis an interview from Napoleon, was paroled, and sent into his own lines to ask an armistice, together with the intervention of Francis on the terms of Prague: renunciation of Poland and Illyria by